The domestic consumer reporting industry serves the expanding information requirements of an increasingly credit driven economy. Low interest rates and increasing competition in the credit card industry have fueled increased demand for consumer credit information.
The principal customers of the industry's credit information services are: (1) national, regional and local credit card issuers; (ii) commercial banks and consumer finance companies; (iii) mortgage companies; (iv) collection agencies; and (v) other entities engaged in either the granting of consumer credit or marketing of services predicated on the credit worthiness of the consumer. Products and services offered to these customers by the credit reporting industry include consumer credit reports, credit risk scores, prescreened lists and skip-tracing services. Skip-tracing is a term to connote those consumers who have failed to comply with a payment program, and who cannot be located.
Traditionally, national, regional and local credit grantors have provided consumer account histories to the major credit repositories free of charge. The credit grantors are incentivized to do so because they are also purchasers of credit reports. The quality of the credit information they receive thus depends upon the voluntary cooperation of all major credit grantors. Also, credit grantors believe that consumers are more likely to pay promptly if they are aware that their payment histories are being reported to the major credit repositories. Credit repositories also gather relevant data regarding bankruptcy filings and tax liens from courthouses and other public records agencies.
These records are combined with the credit grantor data into large centralized databases which are used to compile consumer credit reports and other industry products.
These major credit repositories have been maintained primarily by divisions of TRW Inc., Equifax Inc., Trans Union Corporations, and more recently by Consumer Credit Associates, Inc. Traditional credit reporting businesses store a substantial amount of credit information for many consumers. Sometimes there is so much information on the individual consumers that an on-line review of the information is time consuming and often the data or information is either contradictory or inaccurate. A major shortcoming of the presentation of consumer credit is that it is only a snapshot of the consumer credit worthiness for a short period of time. Indeed, many of the data bases of the credit reporting business are maintained primarily for current data. All credit data that is older than, for example, a few months, is discarded as being unimportant. A snapshot of a person's credit for a short period can be very deceiving, thus allowing for an erroneous extension of credit when it shouldn't be extended, or a denial of credit when it should be extended.
As an example of the foregoing, consumer A may have used his/her credit card during one or more holidays so as to incur a substantial balance with the credit card issuer. However, the past history of consumer A shows that he/she pays off the balance over a period of time, which is exactly the type of credit card use that is desired by the credit card issuer.
Consumer B, on the other hand, is running up a credit card balance because of financial, family, or other problems, and does not intend to pay off the balance. Rather, it is consumer B's intention to either refuse to pay toward the balance, or declare bankruptcy. In addition, the credit history of consumer B shows that he/she is always late in payments and the balance continues to rise. At some point in time, the respective balance of consumer A and B may be the same. If a snapshot view of the traditional credit information of consumer A and B is viewed, they do not look substantially different. However, consumer A is clearly a better risk for extending credit as compared to consumer B. Until the credit histories are made available to the users of the credit information, the significant difference in credit risks of consumers A and B will not be realized.
From the foregoing, it can be seen that a need exists for a credit information data base and processing system that provides a user with many options and alternatives in ascertaining the credit history of a consumer. Another need exists for an improved graphical user interface that provides the credit history information in an efficient and understandable manner.